A Day Trip to Provins

Medieval Charm Just Outside Paris

By Aleyah Solomon

I visited on a warm spring day, boarding the train from Gare de Lyon with no particular itinerary—just my camera, curiosity, and the desire to escape the intensity of the city for a few hours. The journey cost €2.50 and took just over an hour. But the shift in atmosphere was immediate.

Arriving in Provins, the air felt softer, the soundscape quieter. There’s a preserved quality to the town—not just in the UNESCO-protected architecture, but in the way people move. Locals and other visitors to the small town chatted on shaded benches, walked around without hurry, and sat along sunlit walls, watching the afternoon unfold.

Provins feels like stepping out of time. Just over an hour from Paris, it’s a place where medieval walls still stand guard, cobblestone streets twist gently through the town, and rose gardens spill over stone walls with quiet elegance. The slower pace here invites you to walk a little more slowly, look a little longer, and simply be.

I wandered slowly, with no set itinerary or really knowledge of where I was going, I allowed the streets to lead me. A favourite moment: finding a small overlook above the town where the tiled rooftops glowed in the light. Of course my phone nearly died halfway through the day, but a single outdoor outlet saved me. It was the kind of tiny detail that feels oddly perfect in a place like this—useful but unbothered, much like the town itself.

That’s what I love about France: you can hop on a train and, within an hour, be somewhere that feels like another century. There’s so much history woven into towns like Provins, and the beauty is in how unforced it all feels. You’re not being asked to marvel—you simply do.

This photo series captures the essence of that day: the worn texture of stone, the quiet tension between light and shadow, the echoes of history, and the slowness of a place that lets you slip into its rhythm without ever trying to impress.